In my room, there is a painting of a little African American girl in her bedroom practicing ballet in front of a standing mirror. The room is pink, as well as the sheets, the carpet, the mirror, even the ‘little-house-on-the-prairie-‘ looking baby doll that looked identical to the little girl. All the furniture in the room is cream and baby pink, matching everything else. I’ve studied this picture since before I can remember. For years I’d take a moment and just look at the little girl. I would just study her face, and how her expression didn’t match anything she was doing. She had a very strong face, and eyes that would stare, kind of like the Mona Lisa. This scared me as a little, and even some of my teenage years. She looked like she didn’t like me, like I she was upset with me. And I always wondered what I did wrong. I smiled at her, talked to her, and even tried to stand like her. I would be in my room, arms above my head, my body elevated from the ground by my toes, and watched her look at me. I figured if she saw how much I was trying to be like her, she would smile at me. Thinking about it now, it was a bit of a crazy wish, for a painting to change its expression on it’s own for the sake of a little girl. But when I was that small, I believed weird things. Call me gullible, but if you had told me that objects moved on their on like in The Toy Story, I believed you with all confidence. So, its no surprise to discover that I was bent on making that little girl smile. But as I got older, I gave up. I just figured that she was miserable, and didn’t want to smile. She didn’t want friends, just wanted to be alone in her room. I must’ve been interrupting her, by watching her practice. It soon felt like I was walking in on her in my own room. I caught myself avoid going into my room one time, because she was the first thing to see when entering the room. I had finally sucked it up and changed her location to another side of the room. Soon after, I forgot about her, out of sight out of mind. It wasn’t until recently that I looked at her again and realized how innocent and sweet she looked. she, and the doll, looked as if they weren’t doing anything but standing there. I wondered why when I was a little girl she looked so mean, but as an adult, she looked completely different. It could be because I grew up, and my perspective of people changed. Maybe I felt that I was trying to be like her so much, and she didn’t approve. She probably wanted me to just be myself, and not go around trying to please others. I could speculate a whole bunch of reasons, but I honestly don’t know.

0